Skeleton Trivia for Wednesday, 2025-10-08
Honestly, I’d settle for a Pretty-Good Canal
Hiya Skeleton Crew,
We showed An American Werewolf in London1 at the Skeletodeon yesterday night in honor of the Harvest/Hunter’s moon, & lemme tell ya: it was a hoot! Folks were howlin & hollerin all throughout the thing. The only downside is now I’ve gotta replace like 10% of the theater seats, ’cause they’ve got these big mysterious bloody chomp-marks taken outta ’em. Ah well!!
Answers to Last Time
- The Chinese gooseberry’s better known as the kiwi.
- Panama disease is the fungus that’s killin all our bananas!
Today’s Trivias
Trivia 1
Although Panama DOES export lotsa bananas & was definitely exploited by the big fruit companies in the 20th century, it was a kinda different situation than what ya saw in the so-called “banana republics” of Guatemala, Nicaragua, & Ecuador—largely ’cause the U.S. had already been adventurin there (derogatory) for basically half a century! For canal-related reasons, not bananas.2
Ah jeez, I love a canal. So many good ones!
But before I get goin on a canal kick, let’s have one last li’l banana-adjacent3 question: what writer coined the phrase ”banana republic” in the first place? It was in his 1904 novel Cabbages and Kings, though if I’m bein’ honest this fella’s a lot more famous for his short stories, like The Ransom of Red Chief & The Gift of the Magi.
Trivia 2
Lotsa good canals out there in the world. Panama’s an obvious top one, AAA S-tier stuff. I also love me a Grand Canal: ya can put it in Venice or eastern China, I don’t care, just so long’s it’s Grand!
Suez, too, ya can’t forget that one. Ah jeez, I remember back when Darius built the FIRST canal over there to connect the Mediterranean & the Red Sea.4 If I’m bein honest, I dunno why they let it go to pot ... but for whatever reason it wasn’t ’til a crazy French dude named Ferdinand de Lesseps organized a big dig in the 19th century that we finally got it workin again in I guess ya’d call it the modern era.
Hey, do ya remember when that big boat got stuck in the Suez Canal a few years ago? That was a crazy time, eh? Everyone was talkin ’bout the ... the ... oh, whatever it was called. The big boat! The big stuck boat.
Ah jeez, do ya remember what was that ship called?
OK then
Byeeeeeeeeeeeeee
1 RIP to John Woodvine, the British actor who played Dr. Hirsch in that & who died just a coupla days ago. ⬏
2 Sorry if this technicality steered ya away from thinking of Panama as a potential answer to yesterday’s trivia. I didn’t mean to mislead anyone with that, but I guess sometimes I get carried away with my fun facts. ⬏
3 (bananadjacent?) ⬏
4 Or maybe it was he just extended an earlier canal? If I’m bein honest with ya, I wasn’t payin super close attention at the time. ⬏